A couple of month ago I had to plan a stag night in London for a chef, friend of mind. As you may know it takes a lot of planning. Most of the guys going to the three days trip to London were chef or waiters. So the pressure was on to make sure that the restaurants and pubs that I picked were up to their standard. So, I ask my girlfriend if she knew where to look for the best places. She told me that she came across Qype web-site a while back when she had to check on some information about pubs in London.

So, I took her words of advice and log on to Qype to sort out the restaurants and pubs that we were going to visit during our stay in England. I have to say it was very handy. The site had hundreds of reviews and critics under the the tag restaurants London as well as pubs London. I found everything that I needed to know. But the good thing about it was that it was customer review based. Now, it can go either way when it is in that format. Not everybody knows its food or drinks. But I have to say that we did not get much surprises when we got there. Most of the reviews were quite accurate. So I recommend it .

I had a quick look around the web to check who is behind Qype.I wanted to make sure that those reviews and critics were genuine and the site was not fed by reviews from books or fed by restaurant owners.This is what I found: Launched in 2005 Qype has become the biggest pan-European local review site on the net. It offers a reliable and fairly intuitive users, reviews and critics, based search engine that allows you to find from restaurants, a place to stay or get pampered, etc. Well, almost everything you'd need to know about more than 15 000 cities around Europe.
It is multi-platform too. Qype can be consulted on your pc, mobile phone or i-phone.
This is a very handy web-site to bookmark if you plan a trip to Europe or within the old continent.

Frank Krawczyk smoked meat productsBased in Dereenatra, Schull West Cork Frank offers some of the finest smoked meat on the Island. From handmade salamis to pancetta and chorizo. Worth the try.Find him at:- Dereenatra, Schull West Cork- frankk@oceanfree.net- Farmer's markets in Cork and Kerry.

Ballyshiel Milk toffeeTommy Corrigan and his Argentinian wife Karina Gaetani have launched this small milk toffee about 7 years ago, following a traditional Argentinian recipe. For me they make a healthy, natural and very different spreads, dessert sauces or ice-cream flavouring.Find them at:- Kilcrutin business park, Tullamore Co Offaly- ballyshiel@eircom.net- 090 645 4776/ 087 270 1472.

The Organic SupermarketThis is a brand new food store that has just opened about a month ago, on main street Blackrock, Co Dublin. To my knowledge, it is the only shop that offers 100% organic products (and fair trade for most of them!), that is not an health store, in Dublin. Good choice of food and wines and the choice is still widening.Find it at:- The Organic Supermarket, 2c Main Street, Blackrock, Co Dublin, open seven days a week.- 01 2781111.- www.organicsupermarket.ie